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South African Journal of Occupational Therapy
On-line version ISSN 2310-3833
Print version ISSN 0038-2337
Abstract
BARNARD-ASHTON, Paula and FRANZSEN, Denise. Towards a uniform taxonomy of motor terminology: Stage 2. S. Afr. j. occup. ther. [online]. 2008, vol.38, n.3, pp.24-29. ISSN 2310-3833.
A uniform taxonomy within occupational therapy has become a recent focus of discussion in the literature. The study reported on in this paper investigated how South African occupational therapists use and understand terms related to motor performance in children with learning difficulties and developmental delay. This article reports on the second stage of a Delphi Technique, in which the information from an initial study was reformulated. Sixteen expert occupational therapists were then surveyed and asked to rate the level of association (weak to strong) of each characteristic of movement to six motor component terms and to define each term in their own words. The results yielded both quantitative and qualitative data, which revealed that while there was strong consensus among the occupational therapists on some aspects of motor terminology, there was still ambiguity and overlap of understanding, which was reflected in a worrying inconsistency of the descriptions of these terms in the literature and how occupational therapists use the terms in clinical practice.
Keywords : motor terminology; learning disabilities; motor performance; assessment; paediatric; developmental delay.